	<p>
		It seems to me like the Book of Mormon is trying to show that non-believers are wrong not to believe, by making even those that see evidence in the book not believe.
		Even with evidence, these people turn away from the lord, their god.
		This doesn&apos;t match reality.
		People that don&apos;t follow Jehovah tend not to believe in him because there&apos;s a severe <strong>*lack*</strong> of evidence.
		There&apos;s no valid reason for us to believe, so we don&apos;t.
		Take for example the following passage:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 3:29 - 3:31</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass as they smote us with a rod, behold, an angel of the Lord came and stood before them, and he spake unto them, saying:
				Why do ye smite your younger brother with a rod?
				Know ye not that the Lord hath chosen him to be a ruler over you, and this because of your iniquities?
				Behold ye shall go up to Jerusalem again, and the Lord will deliver Laban into your hands.
			</p>
			<p>
				And after the angel had spoken unto us, he departed.
			</p>
			<p>
				And after the angel had departed, Laman and Lemuel again began to murmur, saying:
				How is it possible that the Lord will deliver Laban into our hands? Behold, he is a mighty man, and he can command fifty, yea, even he can slay fifty; then why not us? 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, Laman and Lemuel are hitting Nephi with a rod because Nephi is trying to get them to stay with him and complete their seemingly-impossible mission, assigned to them by Jehovah.
		At this point, Laman and Lemuel have not seen evidence of Jehovah, so they can&apos;t be blamed for not believing, though they really shouldn&apos;t be hitting their younger sibling over it.
		An angel shows up, telling them to knock it off, and explaining that the lord will ensure the one person standing in the way of their goal will be taken care of.
		An angel stands before them and they&apos;re doubting that a deity can take out one measly human?
		I mean, granted, this human is strong, skilled, and commands an army, but versus a deity, what match are they?
	</p>
	<p>
		I think most atheists would agree that seeing an actual angel would be evidence enough of Jehovah&apos;s existence, and we wouldn&apos;t doubt his power.
		I mean, we might doubt that he&apos;s all-powerful, but we&apos;d know he has enough power to take out one individual.
		I mean, he did create the cosmos, after all.
		This theme of disbelief in the face of evidence is continued later, too.
		The whole point of atheism is that there <strong>*isn&apos;t*</strong> evidence.
		If there was, we wouldn&apos;t be atheists any more.
	</p>
	<p>
		Later, these two rebel against the orders of Jehovah again, somehow forgetting he&apos;s got a plan and everything&apos;s going to be fine if they just do as they&apos;re told.
		So, Nephi has to step in and tell them off, reminding them Jehovah&apos;s real and got stuff cooking.
		As Nephi asked:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 7:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				How is it that ye have forgotten that ye have seen an angel of the Lord?
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Even being reminded, these two elder siblings of Nephi remain on the offensive, and try to kill their younger sibling.
		A bit later, they&apos;re finally convinced to calm the heck down, and even repent for their actions, but the point is still clear.
		These two aren&apos;t simply non-believers, they believe and just aren&apos;t followers of Jehovah.
		Christians have a tendency to think you&apos;re &quot;rejecting&quot; their god if you don&apos;t believe in him.
		You can&apos;t reject what you don&apos;t believe to be real though.
		These two characters are later necessary for some major racism, but aside from that, their main purpose seems to be to portray the attitude on those that don&apos;t follow Jehovah, but with a very different attitude than people that actually don&apos;t follow Jehovah tend to have.
		By misrepresenting us atheists as actively rebellious instead of as simply not seeing a reason to believe, it makes it much easier for the Mormons to claim we&apos;re wrong.
	</p>
	<p>
		Later still, we even see a direct confirmation that these two are denying what they&apos;ve seen.
		Laman&apos;s seen speaking here, claiming the angels aren&apos;t talking to Nephi, even though one of them earlier even showed himself to them:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 16:38</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Now, he says that the Lord has talked with him, and also that angels have ministered unto him.
				But behold, we know that he lies unto us; and he tells us these things, and he worketh many things by his cunning arts, that he may deceive our eyes, thinking, perhaps, that he may lead us away into some strange wilderness; and after he has led us away, he has thought to make himself a king and a ruler over us, that he may do with us according to his will and pleasure.
				And after this manner did my brother Laman stir up their hearts to anger. 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Clearly, the implication here is that people will deny very obvious evidence of Jehovah.
		It&apos;s an attempt to deny the actual reality, which is that there <strong>*is no*</strong> obvious evidence of Jehovah.
		All anyone has about him is circumstantial.
		No one ever sees hide nor hair of the guy.
		Here, we see that pointed out as well:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 17:30</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And notwithstanding they being led, the Lord their God, their Redeemer, going before them, leading them by day and giving light unto them by night, and doing all things for them which were expedient for man to receive, they hardened their hearts and blinded their minds, and reviled against Moses and against the true and living God.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		... and again:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 17:45 - 17:47</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Ye are swift to do iniquity but slow to remember the Lord your God.
				Ye have seen an angel, and he spake unto you; yea, ye have heard his voice from time to time; and he hath spoken unto you in a still small voice, but ye were past feeling, that ye could not feel his words; wherefore, he has spoken unto you like unto the voice of thunder, which did cause the earth to shake as if it were to divide asunder.
			</p>
			<p>
				And ye also know that by the power of his almighty word he can cause the earth that it shall pass away; yea, and ye know that by his word he can cause the rough places to be made smooth, and smooth places shall be broken up.
				O, then, why is it, that ye can be so hard in your hearts?
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		I talked to the missionaries about this, and they don&apos;t seem to believe it to be a plot hole like I do.
		Instead, they think it&apos;s something called the pride cycle.
		You&apos;re in Jehovah&apos;s good graces and receiving blessings, but then you get arrogant and forget where those blessings are coming from.
		You start to disobey Jehovah, so you start to lose those blessings, at which point you get angry with him and disobey further, costing you more blessings.
		Eventually, you&apos;re so low that you have nowhere left to go but up, so you humble yourself, and pray for forgiveness.
		You start receiving blessings again, and see that Jehovah is on your side once more, so you try even harder to stay on his good side and you receive even more blessings for your efforts.
		And the cycle begins anew.
	</p>
	<p>
		Maybe this explains the behaviour of Laman and Lemuel, aside from the fact that they&apos;re getting curses to dissuade them from bad behaviour, not blessings to persuade them toward good behaviour.
		I think I can admit that.
		However, this &quot;pride cycle&quot; can also be looked at from another angle: as a blessings/curses cycle.
		Labelled as a pride/humility cycle, it appears that the cycle is fuelled by pride and humility.
		What if it&apos;s actually the blessings and curses fuelling the cycle?
		Clearly, that&apos;s not the case in the Book of Mormon, as the causal relationship is clearly displayed there.
		However, in the real world, Jehovah doesn&apos;t assert his presence enough for us to even be sure he exists.
		People may get prideful based on situation, then humble when everything falls apart.
		When seen from that angle, we have a picture of a world in which the blessings and curses come regardless of behaviour, and it&apos;s behaviour that&apos;s being affected by it.
		If we ignore behaviour, this blessings cycle looks a lot like my own luck cycle.
		I&apos;m not following Jehovah on and off because I&apos;m not following him at all; I&apos;m an atheist.
		Yet the cycle appears to happen just the same.
		If I&apos;m not invoking the wrath and love of Jehovah, and instead just invoking his wrath full-time, the cycle must be completely independent of Jehovah.
		It&apos;s not a pride-driven cycle, and blessings have nothing to do with it.
	</p>
	<p>
		For the record though, I&apos;d like to point out that I don&apos;t actually believe my fluctuating luck is actually caused by some sort of cosmic cycle.
		I&apos;ve noticed that when things go wrong, they all go wrong at once as if such a cycle were in a place, but the idea of said cycle is just a construct to explain what it looks like is happening, not what is actually happening.
	</p>
	<p>
		The missionaries say that the problem of Laman and Lemuel is that while they were good at upholding most of the qualities they should, the one that they were bad at was enduring until the end.
		They brought up how Judas, one of the twelve apostles, also couldn&apos;t endure to the end.
		He&apos;d seen Jesus perform miracles, so he knew the guy to be <del>magical</del> <ins>supernatural</ins>, yet he still sold Jesus out for a little bit of cash.
		I mean, c&apos;mon.
		If you believe there&apos;s an afterlife, are you going to sell out the person helping you get to the good version of it?
		This isn&apos;t all about endurance until the end.
		It&apos;s also about loyalty and even self-preservation.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:11 - 2:13</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				For behold, and also his blood atoneth for the sins of those who have fallen by the transgression of Adam, who have died not knowing the will of God concerning them, or who have ignorantly sinned.
			</p>
			<p>
				But wo, wo unto him who knoweth that he rebelleth against God! For salvation cometh to none such except it be through repentance and faith on the Lord Jesus Christ.
			</p>
			<p>
				And the Lord God hath sent his holy prophets among all the children of men, to declare these things to every kindred, nation, and tongue, that thereby whosoever should believe that Christ should come, the same might receive remission of their sins, and rejoice with exceedingly great joy, even as though he had already come among them.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		We&apos;ve got a couple problems in these passages.
		First, you can&apos;t rebel while being unaware.
		If you do something that some being that you don&apos;t know to exist doesn&apos;t like, that&apos;s not rebelling.
		You can&apos;t mistakenly or unknowingly rebel.
		That&apos;s not what rebelling is.
		This is another of those times where the book tries to frame one thing as another, so it will <strong>*look to believers*</strong> that non-believers are just acting up, and not that we legitimately see no reason to believe.
	</p>
	<p>
		Second, we&apos;re told that those that are in fact ignorant are forgiven.
		That means by spreading the word of Jesus, you&apos;re doing people harm.
		If they believe, they&apos;ve got to jump through hoops to be forgiven.
		But if they don&apos;t, they don&apos;t.
		Not knowing is thus, according to these words, safer.
		But then we&apos;re told that salvation only comes to those that repent and have faith.
		Given the context, I at first assumed that it means that only those that believe will only be forgiven through these measures.
		Otherwise, this passage directly contradicts the one prior.
		But then, we&apos;re told that you have to believe that Jesus will come (future tense, seeing as this was supposedly written before Jesus had supposedly come) and repent to be saved, so being ignorant is exactly one of the things that can damn you.
		So not knowing is unforgivable after all.
	</p>
